A high-touch program where leaders implement real changes while they’re in it
The Problem
Many organizations are seeing the same signals.
Engagement scores are slipping. Burnout is rising. Attrition is harder to ignore. Innovation feels slower and more effortful than it should. Results still matter, but they increasingly depend on heroic effort from leaders and teams.
Leaders feel the pressure from all sides. They’re expected to deliver, support their people, and fix the day-to-day experience of work at the same time. And often, they’re doing that without clear levers or support.
Organizations respond by investing in leadership development. Leaders attend sessions, learn useful ideas, and leave with good intentions.
But when the work itself doesn’t change, neither do the outcomes. Leaders return to the same constraints. The same friction. The same overload.
At that point, the issue isn’t motivation or commitment. It’s how work is designed.
The Work Design Foundation
Work Better By Design starts from a simple truth.
The “results stuff” and the “people stuff” were never actually at odds. They only feel that way when work is poorly designed.
When work is designed well, results and wellbeing reinforce each other. Work becomes regenerative rather than depleting.
This happens when four pillars are activated together.
Deliver
People are equipped to do their best work. Expectations are clear. Work flows without unnecessary obstruction or inefficiency.
Develop
People grow through the work itself. They build skills, take on meaningful challenges, and experiment in ways that energize them and expand what the organization can do.
Connect
People feel part of a team with a shared purpose. They voice ideas, ask questions, and collaboration improves the quality of the work.
Thrive
Energy, boundaries, recognition, and recovery are designed into how work happens, so performance can be sustained.
The key is that these pillars are not tradeoffs. You can design work so that improving delivery strengthens development, connection, and thriving, and those pillars in turn strengthen delivery. That’s the virtuous cycle that changes how work feels and how results are achieved.
What the Bootcamp Is
The Work Better By Design Bootcamp is for organizations that want change to start happening, not just be discussed.
It’s a high-touch, cohort-based experience for 6 to 12 leaders inside an organization, often high-potential leaders who are ready and willing to make change.
Participants learn the Work Design framework and implement real changes with their teams during the course of the program. They are supported as they try things, adjust, and build momentum.
This is not a program where leaders walk away with a plan and hope they get to it later. Implementation is built in, so progress happens while leaders are in the Bootcamp.
What Makes the Bootcamp Distinct
Many programs focus on learning and planning.
The Bootcamp is designed around action.
Leaders don’t just talk about redesigning work. They do it. They test small changes, observe what happens, and refine their approach with support.
This is what allows change to take hold early and continue beyond the formal sessions.
The Bootcamp Format
The Bootcamp includes three live, 90-minute virtual modules, spaced two weeks apart.
Between modules, leaders spend about two hours applying the work with their teams. This time is focused on real conversations and small experiments that improve how work gets done. It is not busywork.
Leaders also have access to me between modules for coaching support, including troubleshooting, role playing, and rehearsing conversations.
After the program ends, leaders continue to have access to coaching for six months, so they’re supported as they keep implementing and expanding what works.
What Leaders Learn and Implement
Leaders learn the Work Design framework and the practical method for applying it.
They’re introduced to the ABOVE approach, a simple way to redesign work through small, inside-the-paygrade actions.
- Ask — Leaders learn how to ask clear, directional questions that surface real insight from their teams, instead of vague feedback or silence.
- Boil — Leaders learn how to translate what they hear into manageable actions within their locus of control, avoiding both overreach and inaction.
- Operationalize — Leaders implement quickly and simply, focusing on small moves that create momentum rather than overengineered solutions.
- Validate — Leaders learn how to watch for glimmers, the early signals that changes are improving how work feels and functions.
- Expand — Leaders learn how to name wins, share practices, and spread what’s working so progress compounds.
Throughout the Bootcamp, leaders are not just learning these steps. They are using them with their teams in real time.
Coaching Support Between Sessions
Implementation brings up real questions. That’s expected.
Leaders often need support with things like framing a difficult conversation, responding to big requests, handling resistance, or deciding what to try next.
The Bootcamp includes access to coaching between modules so leaders can troubleshoot, role play, and rehearse the conversations that turn insight into action.
The Cohort Experience
Because the cohort is small, leaders build trust quickly.
They learn alongside peers facing similar challenges. They share what’s working and what’s hard. They borrow ideas. They peer coach. They stop feeling alone in the work of change.
Over time, the cohort often becomes a lasting leadership community inside the organization.
What Leaders Leave With
By the end of the Bootcamp, leaders:
- Understand the Work Design framework deeply
- Have implemented real changes with their teams
- Have practiced leading work design conversations
- Feel more confident engaging their teams in improving how work gets done
- Feel less pressure to have all the answers, because they know how to create the conditions for insight and ownership
What the Organization Gains
Organizations choose the Bootcamp when they want to address engagement, burnout, attrition, and performance in a practical way.
Outcomes often include:
- Reduced reliance on heroic effort to get results
- Clearer priorities and more efficient workflows
- Stronger collaboration and idea-sharing
- Increased confidence in speaking up
- Greater energy and sustainability in the work
- Leaders sharing a common language around deliver, develop, connect, and thrive
Change begins during the program and continues afterward.
What Others Say About Rachel’s Expertise
Hi. I’m Rachel Cooke.
I help organizations design work so people can deliver strong results without burning out.
After years in corporate HR, I saw leaders doing everything asked of them while the systems they worked in made their jobs harder. Burnout was treated as the cost of performance. I never believed that was necessary.
My work focuses on changing how work is designed so delivering, developing, connecting, and thriving can happen together. I’ve worked with leaders at American Express, Cisco, Splunk, Takeda, Scholastic, Wolters Kluwer, and AMC Networks. Inc. Magazine named me a Top 100 Leadership Speaker. My work has been featured in Fast Company, Business Insider, Bloomberg Quint, and HuffPost. I host Macmillan’s Modern Mentor podcast and hold a master’s in organizational psychology from Columbia and a bachelor’s in human development from Cornell.
Next Step
If you’re seeing signs of burnout, disengagement, or stalled performance and want leaders to start changing how work gets done while they’re supported, the next step is a conversation.
We’ll talk through your context, your leaders, and whether the Work Better By Design Bootcamp is the right fit.